John B. Brew

John Brew is a partner and chair of Crowell & Moring's International Trade Group and focuses his practice in the area of Customs. He has extensive experience in import and export trade regulation, and he regularly advises corporations, trade associations, foreign governments, and non-governmental organizations on matters involving customs administration, enforcement, compliance, litigation, legislation and policy.

John represents clients in proceedings at the administrative and judicial levels, as well as before Congress and the international bureaucracies that handle customs and trade matters. He advises clients on all substantive import regulatory issues handled by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, such as classification, valuation, origin, marking, tariff preference programs, other agency regulations, admissibility, import restrictions, quotas, drawback, audits, penalties, investigations, Importer Self Assessment and Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism programs, importations under bond, the Jones Act, vessel repairs and foreign trade zone matters.

John is a co-editor and author for the ABA's International Practitioner's Deskbook, "U.S. Customs: A Practitioner's Guide to Principles, Processes and Procedures," the interview editor for Kluwer Law International, Global Trade and Customs Journal, and was a member of the International Trade Law360 Editorial Advisory Board in 2014. John has been recognized by Chambers USA, in the area of International Trade: Customs, Chambers Global in the area of International Trade, U.S, The Best Lawyers in America in the area of International Trade and Finance Law, Who's Who Legal in the area of Trade and Customs, and Super Lawyers in the area of International.

Representative Experience

Representing a home textile manufacturer in a favorable classification decision before Customs, the U.S. Court of International Trade and the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, and advising the company on multilateral and bilateral textile agreements.

Advising U.S. importers and exporters of automobile, food, chemical, pharmaceutical, plastic, textile, apparel and petroleum products during NAFTA verifications conducted by United States, Canadian and Mexican Customs officials.

Assisting a U.S. computer manufacturer obtain export licenses for encryption technology, terminate an investigation on alleged OFAC embargo violations, and negotiating the inclusion of the company's products as part of the Information Technology Agreement providing duty-free treatment for imports and exports.

"Overview of African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA)," Workshop sponsored by The Leitner Center for International Law and Justice at the Fordham School of Law, and the Faculty of Law at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana, Africa
(August 2009).
Speaker: John B. Brew.

"Customs 101 for 2006: How U.S. Customs and Border Protection Regulates Commercial Imports," Trade and Customs Law Introduction/Refresher, Georgetown University Law Center and American Bar Association Section on International Law, Washington, D.C.
(February 1, 2006).
Presenter: John B. Brew.

"African Growth and Opportunity Act, Navigating the International Trade Process: A Guide to AGOA Eligibility," The Leitner Center for International Law and Justice at the Fordham School of Law
(2009).
Contributor: John B. Brew.